It wasn't a youthquake, but a youth tremor and a greying population have seen New Zealanders aged 35 to 54 squeezed as a percentage of our voting population.

With youth enrolments down as a percentage of the overall potential voter population this election, a youthquake was always going to be difficult. However, better youth turnout numbers than in 2014 helped counteract the significant greying of voters in those three years.

The good news is that turnout was up across the board, ranging from 6.54 percentage points for those aged 18-24 down to a 0.6pp for those aged 70+. The bad news is that those aged 18-24 made up a lower percentage of overall enrolments than they did in 2014, meaning that their big increase in turnout didn't create a significant change from 2014.

Where the big change did occur was with voters aged 25-29, who increased their representation in the actual voter pool by 0.709pp versus 2014, the largest increase of any age group. Their increase of turnout of 5.45pp, combined with their larger slice of the enrolment pie, and to a lesser extent those aged 30-34, delivered nearly all of the increase in youth voters this election.

The increase though was largely offset by an increase in voters aged 55 and over. With voters aged 70 and over representing 0.704pp more of voters than in 2014, and those aged 55-59 representing 0.240pp more, it largely balanced out the increases in the youth voter.

All of this means that those aged 35 to 54 saw their influence as voters decrease relative to 2014, which was partially driven by their contribution to the pool of enrolled voters also dropping relative to 2014. The biggest drop was in the 40-44 bracket where they contributed 1.026pp less to the final voter pool than they did in 2014.

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